From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Indus Valley Civilization (Mature period 2600–1900 BCE), abbreviated IVC, was an ancient civilization that flourished in the Indus River basin. Primarily centred in modern day Pakistan (Sindh and Punjab provinces) and India (Gujarat and Rajasthan), it extends westward into the Balochistan province of Pakistan. Remains have been excavated from Afghanistan, Turkmenistan and Iran, as well. Historically part of Ancient India, it is one of the world's three earliest urban civilizations along with Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt. The mature phase of this civilization is technically known as the Harappan Civilization, after the [1]first of its cities to be unearthed: Harappa in Pakistan. Excavation of IVC sites have been ongoing since 1920, with important breakthroughs occurring as recently as 1999.[2]
The civilization is sometimes referred to as the Indus Ghaggar-Hakra civilization[3] or the Indus-Sarasvati civilization. The appellation Indus-Sarasvati is based on the possible identification of the Ghaggar-Hakra River with the Sarasvati River mentioned in the Rig Veda,[4] but this usage is disputed on linguistic and geographical grounds.[
Religion
Further information: Prehistoric religion and History of Hinduism
In view of the large number of figurines[50] found in the Indus valley, it has been widely suggested that the Harappan people worshipped a Mother goddess symbolizing fertility. However, this view has been disputed by S. Clark.[51] Some Indus valley seals show swastikas which are found in later religions and mythologies, especially in Indian religions such as Hinduism and Jainism. The earliest evidence for elements of Hinduism are present before and during the early Harappan period[52][53]. Phallic symbols resembling the Hindu Siva lingam have been found in the Harappan remains.[54][55]
Many Indus valley seals show animals. One famous seal shows a figure seated in a posture reminiscent of the Lotus position and surrounded by animals was named after Pashupati (lord of cattle), an epithet of Shiva and Rudra.[56][57][58].
In the earlier phases of their culture, the Harappans buried their dead; however, later, especially in the Cemetery H culture of the late Harrapan period, they also cremated their dead and buried the ashes in burial urns, a transition notably also alluded to in the Rigveda, where the forefathers "both cremated (agnidagdhá-) and uncremated (ánagnidagdha-)" are invoked (RV 10.15.14).
Agriculture
Some post-1980 studies indicate that food production was largely indigenous to the Indus Valley. It is known that the people of Mehrgarh used domesticated wheats and barley,[46] and the major cultivated cereal crop was naked six-row barley, a crop derived from two-row barley (see Shaffer and Liechtenstein 1995, 1999). Archaeologist Jim G. Shaffer (1999: 245) writes that the Mehrgarh site "demonstrates that food production was an indigenous South Asian phenomenon" and that the data support interpretation of "the prehistoric urbanization and complex social organization in South Asia as based on indigenous, but not isolated, cultural developments." Others, such as Dorian Fuller, however, indicate that it took some 2000 years before Middle Eastern wheat was acclimatised to South Asian conditions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indus_Valley_Civilization
War Goddess ATHENA Invoked in South Asia as IIP Slump Heralds DISASTER in Shining India! International diplomacy was defusing tension with India after the militant attack on Mumbai, and action against militant groups should reassure New Delhi, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said on Saturday. Whereas prospects of a military confrontation between the nuclear-armed neighbours has receded in the two weeks since the slaughter of 179 people in Mumbai, India has said a four-year-old peace process is in jeopardy. Normalisation takes time," Gilani said in an interview. On the other hand,India on Saturday piled new pressure on Pakistan to crack down on Islamic militants in the wake of the Mumbai attacks, with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh citing a "moral duty" to combat terrorism.
The United States has been at the forefront of intense diplomatic efforts to stop tension erupting into a full-blown crisis between two countries that have already fought three wars. A Pakistan-based conglomerate of militant groups active in Kashmir, headed by Syed Salahuddin, has "temporarily" dissolved itself with
its leaders going underground in the wake of the crackdown on Jamaat-ud-Dawa and other banned terrorist outfits, a media report said today. The United Jehad Council (UJC) -- which comprises Hizbul Mujahideen of Salahuddin, Harkat-ul-Ansar, Jamiat-ul- Mujahideen, Al-Jihad, Al-Barq, Ikhwan-ul-Mussalmin and Tehrik-ul-Mujahideen -- has closed its offices, removed all signboards and asked its leaders to stay quiet while temporarily dissolving the coalition, the report said.
"Following the Mumbai attacks and the subsequent tension between Pakistan and India, the United Jihad Council has decided to remain silent," an unnamed commander of one of the militant groups in the UJC told 'The News' daily.
He said the current Pakistani leadership is pursuing the policy adopted by ex-President Pervez Musharraf and "statements on Kashmir issued so far by President Asif Zardari had made it clear that the present Pakistan government would extend no support" to them.
Meanwhile, The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and the Russian Space Agency have joined hands to share critical equipments for the Indian
Man Mission to the Moon. India and Russia signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to promote joint activities in the field of human space flight programme during the visit of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev last week.
It means RUSSIA is not READY as yet to loose the traditional Defence and ARNMS Monopolistic ties with India despite Strategic realliance in Indian Ocean Pece Zone making it a WAR ZONE in US lead!
In India, the elite stay above the fray. They live in walled compounds, have their own source of electricity, hire their own security guards and educate their children in private schools, avoiding the issues confronting the government and the masses. But for the first time as it happened that the 60-hour siege that struck the heart of India's financial and entertainment center, killing 171 people, has fractured that secure existence, galvanizing thousands of middle- and upper-class Indians to get involved. A day after the assault ended, dozens turned out for a march along Mumbai's elegant Marine Drive. ``I'm gonna vote!'' shouted Shrenik Kenia, a 24-year-old engineering student. ``We're all gonna vote!'' It's not something many affluent Indians bother with, but mep the state, with its notoriously turgid, corrupt, and inefficient government.
Now the Ruling Hegemonies and their Agencies including National governments and security forces with Creamy Layer Policy Makers have been SET for MASS DESTRUCTION everywhere in this part of the Galaxy so Complex with ETHNIC DIVIDES! Thus, the War Goddess ATHENA is Invoked far away from the TROY of GREECE!
India is hurtling towards an industrial recession despite the much hyped Risilience claims by the outgoing Chettiar Gangsters of World Bank, FIMNMIn and RBI!Indian exports have already recorded double-digit declines in October and November. Imports continue to rise, which could put the balance of payments under immense pressure.The government said on Friday that the Index of Industrial Production in October was 0.4% lower than what it was a year ago. This is the first such decline in industrial output since 1993.
The FREEsenSEX is in CHOPPING times and it is all the PLEASURE for the BEARs! The recent interest rate cuts and fiscal stimulus will make an impact a few months later. Forget 8%: even a 7% growth rate seems unlikely now.
OPEC consensus on output cut-president
2008-12-13 [18:54:39 hrs]
OPEC ministers are in agreement on the need to cut output when they meet on Wednesday in Algeria to prop up sagging prices, OPEC President Chakib Khelil said on Saturday.
"There is an OPEC consensus on the reduction. But I can not tell you (more)," Khelil told reporters.
Since early September, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries has already agreed to reduce supply by a total of two million barrels per day (bpd).
OPEC oil ministers are scheduled to meet in the western Algerian city of Oran on Wednesday amid expectations they will endorse a large cut in supplies to prevent further falls in oil prices.
Khelil, who is also Algeria's energy and mining minister, said Russia and some other non-OPEC oil producing countries like Azerbijan are to due attend the Oran meeting.
But he gave no furhter details about their possible contribution in trimming oil crude supply.
Two more US banks fail, toll reaches 25
13 Dec, 2008 [02:52 PM]
US Regulators closed two small regional banks, in Georgia and Texas, bringing to 25 the number of US bank failures this year. ....Read More
US Federal regulators reach a deal with Madoff
13 Dec, 2008 [02:51 PM]
As investors feared their life savings might be wiped off, Federal regulators are reported to have reached a deal with the Wall Street trader Bernard L....Read More
Bush may tap bailout fund to aid carmakers
13 Dec, 2008 [02:48 PM]
With Congress gridlocked and the economy floundering, the Bush administration declared on Friday it would step in to prevent the "precipitous collapse" of the US auto....Read More
Tata, Parekh, Ashok Ganguly meet PM to discuss slowdown
13 Dec, 2008 [02:47 PM]
With the Mumbai terror attacks rattling business confidence, members of the Investment Commission on Friday called on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and are believed to have....Read More
Kuwait says OPEC should cut oil production
13 Dec, 2008 [02:46 PM]
Moussa Maarafi, a member of the Kuwaiti Supreme Petroleum Council, has said that the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) at its meeting in Algeria next....Read More
German bourse opens office in Beijing: Statement
13 Dec, 2008 [02:45 PM]
Deutsche Boerse, the operator of the German stock exchange, has opened a representative office in Beijing, the latest bourse to do so in a bid to....Read More
Already THREE LAC Corores of national Revenue, the tax Payers` Money and Funds for the Masses have been PUMPED into MONEY Machine and the Infinite BAIOUT PLAN goes on and on! Suppose the Ruling Hegemony decides for yet ANOTHER WAr, What would happen to the STARVING People? Who have no Plastic Money nor the mandatory Purchasing Power to enter in the Market! What wil be their SURVIVAL Strategy? And the Newsbreak:The gunman captured in last month's Mumbai terrorist attacks told police he had originally intended to seize hostages and call the media to make demands, according to his confession statement obtained Saturday by The Associated Press!
Even as Pakistan refuses to accept that the attackers responsible for the November 26 terror strikes on Mumbai are Pakistanis, Mumbai police has come up with another clinching evidence.
Mumbai crime branch chief joint commissioner of police Rakesh Maria has confirmed that Mohammad Ajmal, the terrorist captured alive after the attacks, has written to the Pakistan High Commission seeking legal help.
Maria says that in a three-page letter scripted in Urdu, Mohammad Ajmal has confessed to his role in the 26/11 attacks.
In the letter, Kasab reportedly admits to being a Pakistani national and a part of the Lashkar-e-Toiba operations.
Kasab has also reportedly disclosed details of the LeT leaders and named Zaki-ur-rehman Lakhvi, LeT chief Hafeez Sayeed and Mohammad Kahafa as the key players in the group's training.
Just Think my FRIENDS!
Army Chief Deepak Kapoor on Saturday asserted that Indian security forces are well equipped to handle any challenges saying, the country can produce many Unnikrishnans who will readily sacrifice their lives on the motherland.
Addressing the Passing Out ceremony of Indian Military Academy in Dehradoon, the Army chief said that our security forces have faced various challenges many times and are always ready to handle all kind of difficult situations.
"Our forces will produce many Unnikrishnans who will be ready to sacrifice their lives for the motherland," Chief guest Kapoor said adding, "India is a secular country and the main duty of our soldiers are to protect the countrymen."
He said "our officers not only ensure the security of the country but also uphold it's honour and dignity."
He added that our officers were not only soldiers but also doctors, teachers, environmentalists and technical experts.
Advising the cadets during the ceremony, Kapoor said that one should never stop the process of acquiring knowledge which helps in facing any adversary.
He addressed 498 cadets, including six from Assam Rifles and 24 from foreign countries like Nepal, Tazhakistan and Bhutan on the occasion.
While prestigious 'Sword of Honour' award and Gold medal was bestowed on Abhishek Gurgmukh, cadets Atul Kumar Rai and Kunandan Kumar were awarded with silver and bronze medals respectively during the ceremony
However, Army Banner Award was given to Casino company of Bhagat Batallion.
Just note the US TURNAROUND! You depend so much on it!
The United States has said that Pakistan banned the Jamaat-ud-Dawa for its own interest and not because Islamabad was warned by the Bush administration that it stood to be branded as a terrorist state.
At Foggy Bottom the Spokesman Sean McCormack was asked to clarify a statement by the Defence Minister of Pakistan that Islamabad had to ban the Jamaat because if that hadn't happened, it would have been branded a terrorist state.
"Is that the message the US has sent out?" McCormack was asked. "No," he replied.
"...Pakistan did this because it saw it in its interest. As we have said many, many times over, the threat from violent extremists is as much a threat to Pakistani people and the Pakistani government as it is to anybody else. All that said, it's a welcome step that they took," he said.
"This is a day-by-day process, and it's something that requires vigilance every single day, fighting terrorism," he said making the point that at no time was there any talk of branding Pakistan as a terrorist state.
The Spokesman was also asked to clarify if the banning of the Jamaat would be one of the topics that the Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would be covering when she visits the United Nations next week.
Rice is scheduled to be in New York for two days starting Monday for discussion on a range of issues including Zimbabwe and piracy.
"...there are a lot of different things that she's going to be talking about up there. I'm sure that she will touch on the issues related to India and Pakistan. I know that Foreign Secretary Miliband, at least at this point in time, plans to be up there and she plans to see him. And if they do get together, I'm sure that that topic will come up," he added.
Whoever may be behind the Terrorist activities, they never happen to be the Majority of the People. We may not blame the innocent Pakistani People for the crimes of Pakistani Military, ISI or even the government of pakistan. We never know the role played by United states of America and its NOTORIOUS Intelligence agency CIA, infamous for creating WAR and CIVIL WAR like Environment to protect US ZIONIST interests worldwide. Mind you, after POKARAN, Russia holds the ARMS MARKET MONOPOLY and since seventies America and NATo and the WEST never entered the Indian ARMS Market! Just because of SANCTIONS imposed by the same United satates of America! The Western Weapon Industry was very keen to operationalise the Indo US Nuclear deal and the US Congress obliged so easily. We got the NSG green Signal without any hinderance after DR Manmohan Manipulated Parliamentary Mandate at home! What for President BUSH has done all this HARD Work if US interests are not involved at all. Why does Barack OBAMA is so involved in Indian Affairs! The Ruling Hegemony knows very well that they have the best CHANCE to get an ESCAPE Route out of Recession in SOUTH ASIA if India and Pakistan tend to move into the US Weapon Market with long long shopping list!
Zardari's ability to deliver anything beyond the current crackdown is in serious doubt. In a new twist to the Mumbai terror attack probe, the only surviving terrorist captured during the Mumbai attacks -Ajmal Kasab-has written a letter to the Pakistan embassy pleading for legal aid! What Option remains at last?
May we Consider the Option of War against Pakistan considering that India’s economy could expand at a much lower rate than estimated with data released on Friday showing that industrial output in October contracted by 0.4%, the first time this is happening in 15 years, because of a decline in both domestic and external demand.
Industrial output grew 12.2% in October 2007!
The sharp fall is likely to increase pressure on the government and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to undertake another round of policy measures to boost domestic demand.
Why should we be provoked with Blind Nationalism just because of some terrorist incidents as we know well that United States of America created the GIANT to save its interests worldwide and now has to fight against it. Why should we be a PARTNER of United States of America and indulge ourselves IN yet another HOLOCAUST in the Bleeding Geopolitics South Asian? Why the STATE POWER is not COMPETENT enough to ensure our Safety and security? Is it possible to import safety and Security from united States of America!
Now Government of India is mulling a new anti-terror law to more effectively deal with the scourge. The law ministry has sent a proposal to the home ministry and would very soon declare the contents of the law which will have "reasonable restrictions," Union law minister H R Bhardwaj told reporters here on Saturday.
The minister was non-committal on being asked whether the new legislation will come up before the ongoing session of Parliament, saying it has to be first cleared by the cabinet.
Earlier, addressing the International Conference of Jurists on Terrorism, Rule of Law and Human Rights, Bhardwaj said time had come for a "really very effective" legislation to combat the menace in the aftermath of the Mumbai mayhem last month.
"We would arm ourselves with laws specifically aimed at terrorist and disruptive elements. The government would very soon declare the contents of the law," he said. The minister said the country never thought that it will face terrorism to such an extent. "But now the time has come for really very effective laws," he said.
Goddess ATHENA depicts Power as Indian Goddess Durga. But Durga, in her all forms, is associated with Lord SHIVA. As durga represents the PRAKRITI, Nature and Shiva , the MAN. Eternal relationship in between Nature and Man is thus symbolised in Age OLD Myths in India. Goddess Kali seems to be Aryanised in form of DURGA while Lord remains the same. We see durga mentioned well in Vedic Literature as well as in Upanishads and puran to be believed written by Aryans who created the Goddess replicating Indigenous Kali agnaist aboriginal indigenous black untouchables! Durga kills the Asuras, the aboriginal communities. kali is also described by the Aryans as war Goddess!Aboriginal Gods and Goddesses were ARYANISED to convert the NATIVES in Hindutva and occasionally fighting against the indigenous tribes as well as amongst themselves, that they conceived of some elemental gods and goddesses adopting the aboriginal and indigenous gods and goddesses as Shiva, Kali and even Durga!All documents and literature relating to Indigenous Dravid civilisation were first destroyed in Harappa and Mohanjodoro. US Imperialism did the same thing in Iraq and Afganistan! Mohanjodoro has not any legacy anywhere as they wiped out. Charvak philosophy was diluted in hindutva.south and North Indian dalits and Tribals are divided!ruling galaxy hegemony is NOTHING but but an expression of racial supremacy which began with the destruction of Mahergargh, Harrapa and Mohanjodoro as well as Maya and Inca civilisations!Since the Indus script has not been deciphered and apart from the bathhouse in Mohenjo-doro there are no religious structures! But we have enough evidences of their Indigenous developed agriculture, Civil Society, religion and culture. The Linga and YONI images which later transformed into SHIVALINGA is rooted in MOhanjedoro! The TERECOTA Seal found in HARAPPA depicts the Goddess of fertility, the Earth upsied down as the head lying underneath and the rest of the body stands vertically ERECT with stretching Legs and the stomock generating Production System depicted by storage of cereals. it resembles with the Abstract Modern Painting of Picasso! Not only this, the Goddess has two tigers face to face standing by her side. Mind you, Goddess durga stands on the Lion. She is the Daughter of Himalayas which has been always inhibited by Indigenous people but they were not Black! As the people of Kashir are also not Black but they never happen to be Aryans. We know about Baisno Devi, the Himalayan version of Goddess Durga! Thus, it may be understood that the Goddess of Peace and Fertility was translated as the Goddess of War by the Culture in Aggression, the Aryan!
But our people worship Goddess Kali, the SAVIOUR! She is known as Raksha Kali! The Kali who protects and who, at the same time depicts the fiercest REALITIES of life as we see in the Kali Idol in kalighat , well portrayed by Gunter Grass!
Even today, in my village where the comrades of My Father Pulin Babu established a Co Operative Land Settlement society way back in 1956, naming it after my mother Basanti Devi, the people rooted in the Myths, Legends and Superstitions of different indigenous districts of East Bengal as Jassore,Faridpur, Khulna and Barishal, worship Rakshakali, the Saviour. it is amusing taht even in Bengal, Original Durga image was very different from present form. The eyes were extremely slanted (like bamboo leaves) and the face was almost triangular and mask like. Basanti (Spring) puja is still done with exactly the same iamge. One is Ravana's puja and the other is Rama's (Ramachandra). The Asvina one seems to be a celebration of Rama's puja. The story of the Bengali version of the Ramayana is seen as the starting point of the worship of Durga in the autumn (Sabarotsaba). Little is known about Kalikapurana or any shastras for that matter. Basanti puja rare these days. basanti Puja is organised originally as durga associated with Nature. Lord Rama invoked Goddess Durga with Akal BODHAN to kill RAVANA, the Demon king in Shrilanka!While, Bengali cast Gondho-banik. All worship Shiva on a bull with Durga on lap, blessing with 4 figures accompanying. Not the usual Durga image. Paper merchants worship this type.
The Puja continues in its traditional form in every Summer in Bengali month of Baishak, on Satureday in Amavasya, Dark Moon. Any FAULT in the ritual is avoided as it is feared most in Myth, legend and superstition. I remember those days while just after Raksha Kali Puja, in case of breaking an Epidemic of Small POX or Cholera, the rituals had to be repeated once again with a fresh Raksha Kali IDOL being worshipped! In East Bengal our people tried to save themselves against all kinds of FURY of Nature, be it famine, Be it Cyclone or Floods, be it Epidemics, Worshipping Goddess Raksha kali. She has never been a Goddess of war as we find in Jasimuddin`s Sojan Badiyar Ghat where Raksha Kali was invoked to indulge our people , the Namoshudras to fight the Muslims replicating the infamous Padma BILL Riots. The Legend is Goddess kali was engaged Killing Muslims in Padma Bill. I have heard so many details of the riots described by my Thakuma( mother of my father) and Dididma( Mother of my Jethima, aunt)!To sustain human faith through the centuries, human beings converted earthly heroes and heroines into divine Gods and Goddesses !The early inhabitants believed in village gods and goddesses, tree, and serpent cults ..... was probably Aryanised and taken into the fold. of the Brahmanical deities. The absorption of gods and goddesses. of the primitive people down from the ...It may be noted in the Aryanisation of the South, particularly of the Tamil ... especially the rock cut forms of the Dravid architecture !
Pakistan police have reportedly arrested 167 Jamaat-ud-Dawa operatives and closed down over 50 of its offices across the country in a continued crackdown against the banned group. The Daily Times quoted official sources in Islamabad as saying that three offices of the Jamaat-ud-Daawa in the national capital were sealed on Friday.
``Well-to-do Indians think the state is irrelevant. We keep doing what we do, living in private enclaves, and making money,'' said Nandan Nilekani, co-chairman of Indian software giant Infosys Technologies Ltd. ``This has been a rude awakening.''
The question is, will their involvement make a difference? India is run by a massive, lumbering, outdated and frequently corrupt bureaucracy. While a civil service job used to be among the greatest professional plums for India's educated classes, these days the rich and ambitious focus far more on the country's fast-growing private sector.
And politics is riddled with century's-old class conflicts, religious divisions and nepotism.
Also, in the 60 years since independence, India's leaders have done the math and turned to the nation's hundreds of millions of rural poor to win office, prompting the middle class to withdraw from the political process.
The rich and well-connected have been largely unscathed by the wave of terror strikes that roiled India in recent years, with most bombs exploding in markets and on public trains. The Nov. 26-29 attacks hit far closer to home. The gunmen attacked south Mumbai, a center of social power graced with stately old buildings and great, weeping trees.
Two of the targets were the iconic Taj Mahal hotel and the luxurious Oberoi hotel, sites of countless business meetings and the playground for Mumbai's high society.
Residents lost friends, relatives and colleagues and live with the dread that it could have been them trapped as the gunmen sprayed five-star restaurants with bullets and grenades. Many now wonder where to meet for lunch.
The attack ``has galvanized the middle class and elite like no other act of violence has before,'' said Nilekani, who has just written a book on Indian society and politics, ``Imagining India: Ideas for the New Century.''
Their quest for change is not unprecedented. The swelling ranks of educated, affluent Indians have already transformed the country into an emerging economic power and a high-tech leader. But this has been largely done despite the government and India's primitive infrastructure.
For now, the frustrations amount to little more than symbolic gestures and an inchoate demand for change.
The Society of Indian Law Firms, a group of 60 top firms across the country, filed a petition last week, urging the Bombay High Court to compel the government to take concrete steps to improve security and set up a citizen oversight committee to make sure reforms stay on track. The Bombay Chamber of Commerce and Industry, a group of about 2,000 businesses based in Mumbai, signed on in support.
Sriram Subramanian, who runs a consulting company, sent out an e-mail to a hundred friends and colleagues calling for a new political party, which would draw on the expertise of India's educated urbanites.
The comments from Indian prime Minister came after Pakistan arrested dozens of members of the charity Jamaat-ud-Dawa, suspected of being a front for militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) -- which India blames for last month's attacks on its financial hub.
Pakistan has placed the charity's leader Hafiz Saeed under house arrest and ordered its assets frozen after the UN Security Council listed it as a terror group following the attacks that left 172 people dead, including nine gunmen.
"The forces of terrorism, inspired by ideologies of hatred, intolerance and exclusion, pose today a fundamental challenge to liberal democracies," Singh told a conference of jurists in New Delhi.
"They pose a challenge to democracy at home, to democracy in our region, to democracy around the world," he said.
"Governments and authorities in our region and elsewhere have therefore a moral duty to act firmly and quickly," he said.
New Delhi had previously blamed "elements in Pakistan" for being behind the 60-hour siege that ended on November 28, raising tensions between the two nuclear-armed South Asian rivals.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has said "non-state actors" operating on Pakistani soil were responsible for the attacks.
Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee meanwhile voiced scepticism over Pakistan's arrests of Saeed and Maulana Masood Azhar, the leader of Jaish-e-Mohammed, which like LeT is fighting Indian rule in Kashmir.
"We shall have to see whether these (actions by Pakistan) are taken to their logical conclusion," said the minister, noting Islamabad had detained the pair in 2002 but later released them.
"All our common friends and responsible statesmen are playing their important role in defusing the situation and I'm pretty sure that will work."
Gilani said Pakistan was taking its own action against groups and people put on a U.N. terrorist list, and the chances of India resorting to air strikes against militant targets were remote.
"I think India is equally responsible and they won't. There is no fear of anything like that," Gilani said.
Indian and U.S. officials have levelled accusations at Lashkar-e-Taiba, a jihadi organisation that fought Indian rule in Kashmir and, according to analysts, has had close ties to the Pakistani military's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency.
India's Parvathy Omanakuttan was adjudged the first runner-up at the Miss World pageant here Saturday evening. Miss World Pageant
She impressed the jury with her looks and quick wit and was one the five finalists out of the 109 contestants at the Sandton Convention Center. However, she was finally beaten by Miss Russia.
Miss Trinidad and Tobago was named the second runner-up. The others in contention in the final five were Miss South Africa and Miss Angola.
India had high hopes on 21-year-old Parvathy to win the crown that last came to the country in 2000.
India boasts of Miss Worlds like Reita Faria (1966), Aishwarya Rai Bachchan (1994), Diana Hayden (1997), Yukta Mookhey (1999) and Priyanka Chopra (2000).
The ruling Hegemonies in this divided Bleeding Geopolitics of south Asia have done everything to make the Nation State Colonised SURRENDERING Sovereignity and FREEDOM. Have done everything to Americanise the People ENSLAVED with inherent inequality, injustice and GRADED Caste system sustaining! They havd done every thing to DESTROY Production systems and Productive FORCES. Corporate IMPERILISM, supported by Fascism and BETRAYAL of MARXISTS, has the Last Say in this Subcontinent. Now we share the US Destiny in Life and Death! In the wake of last month's terror attacks in Mumbai and the subsequent crackdown by the Pakistan Government on the banned
Lashkar-e-Toiba and its political wing - the Jamaat-ud-Dawa, a coalition of five major Jihadi organisations, led by militant commander Syed Salahuddin, has disappeared.
According to The News, these Jihadi organizations have temporarily dissolved themselves, closed down their offices, removed all signs and asked their leaders to stay quiet.
Data released by the Central Statistical Organisation (CSO) on Friday showed that in the first seven months of this fiscal year (April-October), the Index of Industrial Production (IIP) grew 4.1% compared with 9.9% during the same period a year ago. The output of the manufacturing sector, which accounts for around 80% of IIP, shrank 1.2% in October, while those of the electricity and mining sector rose 4.4% and 2.8%, respectively. And while the output of intermediate goods and consumer goods companies fell, those of companies in the basic and capital goods sectors registered weak growth. Economists here do not expect the factory output numbers to get better in a hurry.
“Industrial production may somehow perform better in coming months. But for a country like India, any sub-5% growth in industrial output is pathetic. Industry should grow at around 9-10%,” said Dharmakirti Joshi, principal economist with credit rating agency Crisil Ltd. His estimate of industrial output in 2008-09 is 5%.
Meanwhile,Foreign lender, HSBC has decided to cut 193 jobs in its Indian consumer assets business segment after it reviewed the portfolio in the backdrop of the prevailing economic conditions, the bank said.The bank is restructuring its consumer assets business division in the country owing to the economic downturn and had made "every efforts to redeploy the staff," HSBC said in a statement on Friday.
"Some 620 people have been redeployed in suitable positions in the bank and other group entities in India. The leavers have been placed in the bank's priority returners scheme which will give them first preference for suitable jobs that come up in the next year," the statement said.
Nine patrol vessels deployed for India's coastal surveillance
In a significant step towards strengthening India's coastal surveillance, the Indian Customs Saturday commissioned nine advanced patrol vessels and announced plans to acquire 100 more within the next five years at a cost of Rs.3.58 billion.
Chairman of Central Board of Excise and Customs P.C. Jha commissioned two classes of vessels - three category I vessels and six category III vessels at the Mumbai Port Saturday evening.
These vessels shall be stationed in Mumbai, Raigad, Ratnagiri (Maharashtra), Goa, Mangalore (Karnataka), Kochi, Trichy (Kerala), Okha, Kandla, Valsad and Umargaon (Gujarat).
The vessels, built by a Malaysian company, Gold Bridge, can stay at sea for up to three days. The category I vessels are air-conditioned, 20 metres in length and can attain speeds of up to 25 knots, Jha said.
The category III vessels, built by a Singapore company, Brunswyck, are small speed boats measuring between six to nine metres and capable of achieving speeds of up to 35 knots and can remain at sea for up to 10 hours.
The induction of these vessels comes barely a fortnight after a group of terrorists entered Mumbai unobtrusively from the Arabian Sea and created mayhem for almost three days in which over 170 people lost their lives and nearly 300 others were injured.
"As an enforcement agency we are continuously faced with new challenges and complexities and the greatest challenge is to augment our capacity to respond effectively to those seeking to breach our coasts," Jha said while commissioning the vessels.
The government will acquire another 24 such vessels over the next 15 months from Gold Bridge, he added.
In addition, a contract has been signed to acquire advanced patrol vessels in the category II, which are 13.5 metres long with a speed of 40 knots. Equipped with sophisticated communication and navigational aids like radar, GPS, satellite communication, VHF and other equipment, these shall be built by Bahrain's Al Dhaen Craft, Jha said.
In the first phase of this programme, surveillance on the west coast shall be beefed on the coastal states of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka and Kerala.
India has a total coastline measuring 7,600 km.
The new vessels shall also augments efforts to monitor smuggling activities, narcotics trade through the sea, sneaking in arms and ammunition, apart from checking potential terrorist threat and bio-security threats.
The three large vessels commissioned today are named "Ila", "Chitra", and "Kaushalya" after the former senior women officers who served the customs department.
Cranked-up SEZs won’t be denotified
13 Dec 2008, 0115 hrs IST, Amiti Sen, ET Bureau
NEW DELHI: The Centre—which recently decided to denotify DLF’s “barren” special economic zone (SEZ) in Delhi—will not allow operational SEZs, where
units have been set up, to be denotified. “The SEZs where units have been set up cannot be denotified,” commerce secretary GK Pillai said.
The Goa government, which has been urging the Centre to take steps to denotify the three notified SEZs in the state, will have to continue its discussions with developers to come to an amicable settlement on the issue. The state government had declared last December that it would not allow any SEZs and all existing zones would be scrapped.
Since three of the zones in the state are notified and have units, the state is finding it difficult to get rid of them.
Speaking to ET, Mr Pillai said it will not be difficult to denotify the DLF SEZ in Delhi as there are no units in the
zone and the land is barren. However, the zones which has units cannot be denotified as it would affect the unit owners and the people employed in the units.
SEZs, where developers have undertaken construction activity, can also be denotified if there are no units in the zone and the developers agree to refund the tax benefits they received during the construction phase.
SEZ developers and units get a host of tax breaks including tax-exemption on profits for a specified period. The problem of credit squeeze and global economic slowdown which has cast its shadow on the Indian industry at large, is also making it difficult for SEZ developers and units.
The commerce department has already asked the RBI to expedite action on the Centre’s decision to grant infrastructure status to SEZs (for all activities barring the acquisition of land), so that SEZs get access to funds at lower rate of interest.
In the board of approval (BoA) meeting of SEZs earlier this week, about six SEZs had applied for partial denotification of their land. Mr Pillai pointed out that it was routine for SEZ developers to ask for both pruning and expansion of their areas. “As long as the SEZs do not breach the minimum area and maximum area norms, it is allowed,” he said.
13 Dec 2008, 0011 hrs IST, ET Bureau
MUMBAI: A funds-starved government has breached its enhanced ways and means advances (WMA) limit for the second half. And forex reserves continued
their downslide after a pause of one week. The reserves dipped $1.8 billion during the week ended December 5.
According to data released by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in its weekly statistical supplement (WSS), government banks borrowed Rs 30,986 crore — way higher than the enhanced limit of Rs 20,000 crore, which was revised upwards from Rs 6,000 crore in November in anticipation of revenue mismatches, as two government bond auctions were cancelled during the month.
WMA is a temporary advance to meet government revenue mismatches. At any given point in time, the government cannot have an outstanding borrowing over the prescribed limit under this facility. When 75% of the limit of WMA is utilised by the government, RBI may trigger fresh floatation of market loans. Borrowings within the prescribed limit are at the prevailing repo rate, while loans in excess of the limit attract an additional 2% interest.
Following a severe liquidity squeeze through October, the central bank on November 12 had enhanced the WMA limit to Rs 20,000 crore until December 31, 2008. RBI had then said, “The temporary enhancement of the limit of WMA will help meet the unanticipated mismatches between government payments and receipts arising from the cancellation of two auctions scheduled for October 2008, and the bunching of expenditure following the supplementary demand for grants.”
Though reliance on RBI was anyway anticipated, what is disconcerting is the fact that the amount ended up being more than what was envisaged earlier. This was largely because the government virtually exhausted its resources required to meet daily administrative expenses with virtually no market borrowings even in November too, according to an economist with a leading brokerage house. Also, there has been a marked slowdown in revenue this year, which could have shrunk the government’s revenue kitty. It was by end-October that the government implemented the recommendations of the Sixth Pay Commission and also settled the arrears to government employees.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Market_News/Higher_WMA_limit_not_enough_for_govt/articleshow/3830484.cms
Hopes of further rate cuts, fiscal boost to play on market sentiment
13 Dec 2008, 1039 hrs IST, Surya R Kannoth, ECONOMICTIMES.COM
MUMBAI: The show of resilience that Indian bourses displayed on Friday paint a healthy picture for the markets in the forthcoming week. Hopes of
further rate cuts by the Reserve Bank of India and prospects of a second round of fiscal incentives may keep the momentum going.
"The second half of Friday's session conveys buoyancy returning to the market. Unless the US markets tank tonight in reaction to the failure of the auto makers' bailout, (although it seems unlikely) there could be some downside for our markets. But our markets seem poised for a steady upmove with another round of fiscal stimulus on the cards," said Sandeep Shenoy, head-equities at PINC Research.
Moreover, the image of FIIs scrambling en masse to the exit doors has changed with the reversal of trend in FII activity in the month of December. Till date this month, FIIs have turned buyers to the tune of Rs 2048.7 crore in equities, according to SEBI data. Anlaysts feel that the trend is likely to remain intact till the month end.
"In the last one week, we have observed that despite external insecurities, the Indian market has shown strength. Even after the collapse of the US automakers bailout and dismal IIP data, Indian equities showed remarkable strength. Bond markets were rallying on hopes of another round of rate cuts and fiscal package measures next week. This could keep the market sentiment upbeat," said Anita Gandhi, head-institutional business at Arihant Capital.
The government is likely to announce another fiscal stimulus package next week aimed to prevent further deceleration in India's growth rate, Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath said.
"The package will be directed at employment-intensive sectors. It could include sops for engineering and textile sectors as well as refinance for exporters," he said at the sidelines of a function organised by Spanish Institute of Foreign Trade.
According to initial estimates with the commerce ministry, exports have fallen by over 10 per cent in November compared with growth of over 30 per cent in the same month last year. This will be the second consecutive month in which exports have dipped owing to a waning demand from overseas clients.
The new package is likely to include enhanced rates of Duty Drawback and Duty Entitlement Passbook Scheme, which will allow exporters higher reimbursements of indirect taxes paid. Moreover, some sectors like textile could get additional subvention in interest rate on export credit.
India's industrial production unexpectedly declined in October. Although the Indian economy depends largely on its services sector, analysts feel a contraction in the manufacturing sector is still of concern to its overall growth outlook. The slump in industrial output during October was likely attributed to a decline in both domestic and external demand.
The industry recorded negative growth for the first time in 15 years, falling to 0.4 per cent in October as against 12.2 per cent expansion a year ago as the impact of the global economic downturn deepened in the country. The fall is partly due to a dip of over 12 per cent in India's exports.
Policy makers said the fall was bigger than expected even as they exuded confidence that the December 7 stimulus package would arrest any further decline.
Job losses force investors to turn traders
12 Dec 2008, 1620 hrs IST, Mandar Nimkar, ECONOMICTIMES.COM
MUMBAI: Long time investors have turned traders as the spilling over effect of the deepening global recession has started trouble their daily bread Tips to get your dream job
When dream job is not perfect
Cos with maximum volatility
Stock buyback & how it's done
and butter.
Increasing fears of job losses have prompted investors to raise cash levels and make money out of the intraday volatility.
The high volatile trading seen in the markets in the last few months was the result of the change in investor sentiment and attitude. The cascading effects of the global recession have changed the basic rules of the game.
The emerging economies like India have also not been spared from the slowdown threat. Job cuts, though not severe in Indian industries, is still creating havoc among the workforce. Employees from IT, realty and auto sectors are more worried about their job security. Employees, who were the long term investors in the stock markets and have lost their jobs, are now attracted towards intraday trading.
Kiran Bhagat who was with one of the top IT companies had invested Rs 1,00,000 on April 3, 2006 when Nifty was at 3473 level. Even after holding his shares for two years, he incurred a loss of Rs 17000 as on December 11, 2008. He would have remained invested for a longer time if he could have saved his job.
"I could have kept my investments for a longer duration but the sudden job loss has forced me to liquidate my investments at loss. However, I had invested Rs 25,000 on Oct 27 when Nifty was at 2450 levels and by October 31, I earned about Rs 3000 on my investments. A return of 12 per cent in 4 days," said Bhagat.
Same is the case with another long term investor Unmesh Deodhar. He lost about Rs 48000 in the recent stock market carnage. "Investment from a long term point view is good, but when you are out of job or uncertainty lingers over your daily income you have to change yourself as per the situation," said Deodhar.
He further added that, "When the future is not known and the present is bleak one should always play with the momentum. For me it's better to loose some money in short term trade rather than losing from a long term approach. Now I have started going by my gut feelings. It helped me immensely for intraday trading."
Fears of slowdown get dense as the index of industrial production data has turned into negative for the first time in at last 10 years. India's index of industrial production for October turned negative for the first time in last 10 years. The industrial production fell to -0.4 per cent in October against 4.8 per cent in September and 12.22 per cent a year earlier.
"It is but obvious that when one's source of income comes under the uncertainty, he ought to change his investment attitude. This is very natural thing. The volatility increases when players opt to go for very short term trade to avoid locking money for longer duration. However, there is a high risk for the unprofessional investors to trade from a very shorter time perspective or an intraday trading," said Tanuj Shukla, analyst with Krug and Bordan Advisory.
Systemic reforms for internal security
13 Dec 2008, 0214 hrs IST,
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Systemic_reforms_for_internal_security/articleshow/3830788.cms
The fundamental problem with India’s internal security policy is that it is merely reactive and not proactive, and that the initiatives are just ad
hoc and not systemic and sustained. It is often limited to heightened rhetoric post-terrorist attacks, hurling allegations upon Pakistan and followed by a few days of high alert and increased police presence. In a matter of few days, everything returns to square one and the lull creeps in, till another identical terror attack.
Contrast this to the US reaction towards internal security, post the 9/11 attacks. The US initiated one of the largest multi-layered reforms to integrate its federal, state and local government efforts to secure its land, maritime, air, space and cyber domains.
The creation of the department of homeland security enabled synergy of efforts of otherwise disparate departments and agencies of the federal and local governments, thereby unifying the vision and ensuring cohesive strategic approach.
This was followed by the creation of office of director, national intelligence, the homeland security council, and the national counterterrorism centre. Extensive legal reforms included the US PATRIOT Act, the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, and the Protect America Act of 2007. And what was the outcome? Despite being the prime target of global terrorism, the US did not have a single incident of major terrorist attack over the past seven years.
India has to necessarily learn lessons from the US experience and follow suit. To begin with, we should have a dedicated ministry for internal security, which would integrate the host of agencies and departments involved in preventive operations, enforcement of law, collection of intelligence, tasks of immigration, customs, coastal security and criminal investigation and prosecution upon such crime. Federal crimes, especially terror attacks, inter-state organised crimes, and Naxalite movements need to be tackled exclusively by federal agencies for investigation and prosecution.
For this purpose, an exclusive federal agency for investigation, and a federal directorate of prosecution is
necessary. A federal intelligence agency should convert raw intelligence inputs into credible, actionable and timely responses; and all agencies including IB, RAW, military intelligence, directorate of revenue intelligence and all state intelligence agencies should report to it.
Extensive legal reforms should be undertaken on a war footing. Legal and structural reforms are badly needed to prevent economic and cyber crimes, which can decimate the country. Criminal justice system should be overhauled at least for the limited purposes of investigating, prosecuting and trying persons accused of crimes against national security, in a manner comparable with military courts.
India’s borders are porous and we do not have an immigration policy or an enforcement system similar to that of the US. Cross-border infiltration from Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan is detrimental to national security. As a long-term strategy, we should deport all the illegal migrants from neighbouring countries.
Financial inclusion for the under-privileged
10 Dec 2008, 1803 hrs IST, Nishthala Ramakrishnan,
Bhavani Shankar, a plumber who hails from Firozabad in Uttar Pradesh, has been working in Mumbai for the past eight years. With great difficulty he
managed to meet the KYC norms of a public sector bank, and finally he opened a no-frills bank account in a branch close to his Mumbai home. Four months after opening the account, he had accessed it only twice. The travails of an irregular income continued to trouble him.
When I asked Bhavani why he had not yet opened a recurring deposit with his account, so that he could save the excess income he made during the peak periods of the year, such as during festive times, he looked bewildered. “Nobody at the bank told me anything, once the bank account was opened. What does this recurring deposit mean?”
In the statistics of the Government of India, Bhavani would be counted as one of the financially included, but on the ground, nothing has changed for him. The staff at the bank had fulfilled the statistical requirement of opening a bank account but had nothing else. Unfortunately Bhavani’s is not an isolated example. In a study by the management consulting firm, The Boston Consulting Group, it is estimated that close to 40% of all the no-frills account holders rarely access their accounts. While the bank account holders in rural India face other challenges such as the cost of reaching the banks as well as potential loss of income for that day, in urban India, the problem is essentially one of financial illiteracy.
What is financial inclusion? It is the access that an individual has to the full range of financial services, including savings, credit, insurance and investment advice.
At one end of the spectrum is the financially privileged individual who is constantly pursued by banks and other financial institutions wanting to give him loans, credit cards etc. (Anybody who has been at the receiving end of a persistent tele-caller trying to sell a credit card, guaranteed free for a life time, would fall into this category!). At the other extreme end are those who do not even have a bank account. But, as Bhavani’s example illustrates, having an account alone is not enough.
What is imperative is a systematic process which lays down the series of steps that the bank-staff need to go through in making the full range of financial services available to the individual with a no-frills account. Let’s take these up one by one.
Savings account: Most self-employed people belonging to this category earn in cash. They need to be coached on the habit of putting their surplus money beyond their immediate needs, in the savings account, through regular deposits. The life time habit of keeping this money either tucked away in the house in some corner, or with a ‘reliable friend’ is hard to break and needs diligent coaching.
Insurance: One of the greatest dangers for the self-employed with limited income is a relatively huge outflow of cash due to medical emergencies. For a person with a monthly income of Rs 4,000, a hospitalization stay costing Rs 30,000 would beggar him for a long time to come. Added to this is the loss of income during the period of hospitalization. These days, insurance companies have several simple products which for an annual payment of Rs 500 to Rs 600 can offer hospitalization cover, under a group scheme. The banks could offer a group cover option to all their no-frills account holders, furthering their financial stability.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Financial_inclusion_for_the_under-privileged/articleshow/3819226.cms
Pakistan continues crackdown on Jamat-ud-Dawah
Islamabad (IANS): Pakistan's law-enforcing agencies on Saturday continued their countrywide crackdown against the Jamat-ud-Dawah (JuD), proscribed by the UN Security Council in the wake of the Mumbai terrorist attacks.
Reports said that 11 more arrests were made from different parts and almost all offices of the JuD had been closed down either by the security agencies or by the JuD itself.
An interior ministry official said three out of four men who came under sanction by the U.N. Security Council Sanctions Committee on Wednesday — Muhammad Saeed a.k.a. Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, Haji Muhammad Ashraf Arian, and Mohmoud Mohammad Ahmed Bahaziq — were apprehended, while the agencies were conducting raids to arrest Arian, an important member of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).
However, media reports said Arian had died some six years back. A report by GEO television quoting his close relatives said Arian died during his arrest in jail in 2002 after he was picked up from his home from interior Sindh.
Arian's family migrated from Indian Punjab to Sindh in 1947 during the partition and since then was living there. His family members said security officials had raided their house and they were shown his death certificate issued by jail authorities.
Declare Pakistan a 'terrorist state', UN urged
New York Over 100 activists of a US-based Indo-American group, affiliated to the BJP, held a protest demonstration outside the United Nations headquarters here, demanding the world body declare Pakistan a ‘terrorist state’ in the wake of the Mumbai attacks.
"Nothing short of that would help," the supporters of the Overseas Friends of BJP (OFBJP) asserted, while dismissing sanctions against Pakistan-based Jamaat-ud-Dawa, a front organisation of the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) blamed for the November 26 attacks, and four of its men as an ‘eye wash.’
Pakistan never implemented its earlier ban on LeT and allowed its leaders to work in freedom to recruit and train terrorists and collect funds, they charged on Friday.
"What is different this time?" they asked and sent a petition to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon demanding that the world body threaten Pakistan with action unless it reins in terrorists operating from its territory.
"Otherwise, the world would witness another Mumbai massacre soon," they warned, while carrying placards listing the demands.
Several participants suggested India should attack terrorist training camps inside Pakistan if Islamabad fails to do so within a short time.
But the Mumbai attacks, they said, were ‘most audacious’ so far as their planning and execution was concerned and showed that ‘weak action’ by Indian government had encouraged them.
But advocating more balanced approach, NRIs for Secular and Harmonious India (NRI-SAHI) commended the Indian government for not escalating the situation on the borders with Pakistan while simultaneously sending a strong message to Islamabad against encouraging terrorist outfits.
Cautioning the opposition parties which are demanding ‘war’ with Pakistan, NRI-SAHI said any conflict would be ‘disastrous’.
"Children of both countries need books, need bread and not bombs and bullets," it said.
It also pointed out that Pakistan itself has been victim of terrorism and has suffered severely at the hands of religious extremists.
But it is important that Pakistan destroys all terror network so that the region could live in peace, it added.
It's 'soul-searching' time for Pak. media
Islamabad (PTI): As the Pakistani government cracks down on terrorists linked to the Mumbai carnage, the media in the country has embarked on a "soul-searching exercise", with questions being raised as to why the Islamic nation has become "the hub of militancy and terrorism.
"Soul-searching is in order, and an acceptance of the fact that Pakistan is indeed a hub of militancy and terrorism, the influential Dawn newspaper said on Saturday.
The Pakistani government has cracked down on the banned militant group Lashker-e-Toiba (LeT) and its affliate group Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), which has been declared a terrorist organisation by the UN.
The newspaper lamented that even though an overwhelming majority of Pakistanis do not support militancy "a small fanatical fringe has come to dictate the agenda" of the country.
In an editorial headlined 'The common enemy,' it said "we have a collective responsibility to look inwards".
The News daily said the JuD and the LeT were known to have scouted Punjab for suitable people to join their ranks.
"It is only when its roots are pulled out that an organisation like the JuD can be stopped. Otherwise, like a weed, it will continue to spread rapidly," it said in an editorial on Saturday.
The media has highlighted the pull of money and identity for the self-styled 'jihadis'. "The resentment the powerless feel may be cloaked in anti-Americanism or religiosity but in actual fact it boils down to a class conflict," Dawn argued.
It warned that as long as nothing is done to address the growing underemployment in this country, "the militants will find no shortage of fresh recruits". "At least that is the case in Pakistan," it added.
The Dawn said becoming part of a militant or terrorist organisation "empowers poor, impressionable young men". It cited the case of Ajmal Amir Kasab, the sole terrorist caught alive in the Mumbai carnage. Kasab, who hails from Faridkot, apparently first sought refuge from poverty in crime and then gravitated towards jehadi outfits.
The paper demanded the country's leadership to inform the nation in unequivocal terms" that extremism will enjoy no sanction and will not be tolerated.
The News highlighted the fact that many of the leaders of the militant organisations were backed by the country's top spy agency to fulfill its diplomatic agenda set by its leaders.
It said that in the mid-1980s, the LeT and Hafiz Muhammad Saeed enjoyed the backing of the CIA and the ISI to battle Soviet troops in Afghanistan.
"This patronage helped it to evolve into an organization believed to be one of South Asia's largest militant forces. The links with elements within the ISI are thought to have been retained as the guns turned away from Afghanistan and towards Kashmir", The News underlined.
"This background means that the current action against the JuD may not be enough," it stressed, for "Its tentacles run deep and enwrap many minds".
In effect, the media argued that Pakistan as a nation "face isolation, and internal ruin" if the militants are not "brought to book.
India has blamed Pakistan-based LeT and its front organisation JuD for planning and carrying out the Mumbai attacks on November 26 that killed nearly 200 people.
On the other hand,A.R Rahman pays tribute to the bleeding city as Expressindia reports:
A.R Rahman is a name that is synonymous with excellence in music and he is breaking new grounds with his music each time. With the nomination ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ for the Golden Globes, Rahman has added yet another feather on his cap. At a recent launch of a new music collection in collaboration with Nokia, Rahman expressed his vision to connect India through music.
“In today’s time a song like ‘Jiya Se Jiya’ becomes even more relevant as it gives the message of embracing everyone irrespective of their region, religion or language,” he added.
Expressing his condolences for the victims of the Mumbai attack, he saluted all the peace keepers who helped in saving the bleeding city. For A.R Rahman, art is like medicine in these trying times.
He felt the need to escape from the city to change his frame of mind and the nomination of ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ for the Golden Globes has been the only good news that comes his way as he lost a co-worker to the terror attack.
Rahman hopes to bring a smile back on the faces of the people with this album and claims he would have been jumping had it not been for the tragedy. The album also includes tracks from Mann Chandre, Kural, Mylapore Blues and Mosquito.
http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/A-R-Rahman-pays-tribute-to-the-bleeding-city/397675/
A hoax call and Pakistan went up in smoke!
Press Trust of India
Posted: Dec 12, 2008 at 1442 hrs IST
Islamabad Spoof writers across the globe are churning out stories on the hoax telephone call that almost sparked fears of a military confrontation between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan shortly after the terror attacks on Mumbai.
A spoof put out from Sydney with a dateline of February 1, 2013 reads: "Two hoax calls that were made to US President Sarah Palin and Pakistan President Asif Zardari last night brought an end to world civilization after these calls triggered off a nuclear holocaust resulting in probable death of over 3 billion people, half of the world's population."
The story titled ‘Hoax calls bring about end of the world’ says a caller pretending to be Indian Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani called Zardari and told him that Indian missiles had landed on Lahore and Karachi and Islamabad was next.
"Zardari immediately ordered nuclear strikes on New Delhi and Mumbai in retaliation which resulted in counter-strikes by India. India hit back strongly by nuking Islamabad, Lahore, Karachi and Hyderabad. And Pakistan went up in smoke!" wrote a spoof writer known as Sunil Bhuneja.
Zardari reportedly took a phone call from a man pretending to be India's External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee on November 28, apparently without following the usual verification procedures.
The hoax caller threatened military action against Pakistan in response to the then ongoing Mumbai attacks. India subsequently clarified that Mukherjee had made no such call to Zardari.
According to the spoof, as India and Pakistan were being attacked, another hoax caller called ‘US President Sarah Palin’ and claimed to be Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev.
The prank caller informed Palin that Russia has nuked New York, Los Angeles and Chicago. "Palin ordered half a dozen Russian cities to be nuked. But due to missile-launcher malfunction, a couple of them landed on Chinese soil by mistake.”
Within next half an hour, the US was inundated by nuclear missiles from both Russia and China landing on all its major cities," the spoof item said.
When Palin was running for Vice-Presidency, she got hoaxed by a Canadian DJ who pretended to be French President Nicholas Sarkozy.
PTI
Pakistan has to hand over terrorists, says Pranab
Berhampore India on Saturday said that Pakistan should hand over terrorists wanted by New Delhi immediately and take concrete steps against elements spreading terror.
"Pakistan has to hand over those using its soil to spread terror in India and award exemplary punishment to those directly involved in the Mumbai attacks on November 26," External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said.
Mukherjee said that India had on a number of occasions demanded immediate hand-over of those using Pakistani soil to carry out terrorist activities and now it had to act as per international demand.
Stating that Pakistan was now under international pressure, Mukherjee said, "but it has to act."
Pakistan has to abide by the international demand for action against terrorist organisations in that country, he said.
Referring to agreement signed between former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf that Pakistan soil would not be allowed to be used to target India, Mukherjee said, "we would like Islamabad to keep the sanctity of the agreement."
Expressing himself against the term ‘Islamic terrorism’, Mukherjee said, "Islam does not believe in terrorism. It preaches love and brotherhood and it is the very tenet of the religion."
He was speaking to reporters after inaugurating Sagardighi College, 45 km from Berhampore.
Pak cracks down on terror groups but what next?
Atishay Abbhi / CNN-IBN
Published on Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 19:45 in World section
New Delhi: It is a crackdown unprecedented by Pakistan's standards. Never before has the Jamaat-ud-Dawa faced this kind of heat from the authorities. But what next?
"We expect Pakistan to do much more. We are ready to share any information with Pakistan. Pakistan has to dismantle the entire terror infrastructure," India's External Affairs Minister, Pranab Mukherjee said on Saturday.
However, Pakistani politicians are dismissive.
General Secretary of the PML(Q), Mushahid Hussain said, "There is no evidence that has been shared with Pakistan. It may be existng in South Block or in the Prime Minister's Office. Why is India shy of sharing this with Pakistan?"
The obfuscation and denial is only part of the problem. Pakistan President Zardari's ability to deliver anything beyond the current crackdown is in serious doubt because he no control over the powerful Pakistan army.
Nor does he have any access to Pakistan's most notorious instrument of state power - the ISI. It's widely believed that sections of the ISI have turned rogue, running their own security policy, colluding with groups like the Jamaat-ud-Dawa and the Tehreek-e-Taliban to destabilise their own government.
Former under-secretary-general of the United Nations, Shashi Tharoor says, "Is it being orchestrated at the very top of the Pakistani military and the ISI? Or is it merely being condoned? Is it taking place at the middle and senior levels but not at the very top? We don't know and we don't even know if Pakistan's government knows."
Lacking political or diplomatic leverage, South Block is now relying on the US.
United States Deputy Secretary of State, John Negroponte says, "It's imperative that these are thoroughly investigated and those responsible be brought to account. Efforts are on for investigating those responsible. All our diplomatic partners have responsibility."
This strategy could work as the US wants to stabilise Zardari's civilian government, cut the army to size and eliminate the infrastructure of terror. If that is the goal, India may have no reason to complain.
(With inputs from Shuchi Yadav and Achyut Punnekat in New Delhi)
http://ibnlive.in.com/news/pak-cracks-down-on-terror-groups-but-what-next/80483-2.html
NEW DELHI: Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi on Thursday said that there was need to reform heavy-layered security apparatus which protected
persons like himself, even as he called for a greater price to be attached to every Indian life lost in a terror attack.
In remarks that could be seen as a critique of a “soft state”, Rahul said a reason why India had suffered long from terrorism was because it tolerated the deaths of its people. He said this had led to an increasing scale of violence against the country.
Noting the Mumbai attacks were a watershed of sorts, he said they marked a “massive escalation of terrorism” but while signalling the arrival of new threats Rahul argued that the terror in Mumbai was a part of what has been happening for long. At stake was nothing less than the democratic freedoms Indian people enjoyed including the freedom of press.
He was critical of heavy layered security for VIPs and said such institutions tended to be too hierarchical — like the one that protected him. “I have found that the officer on the ground does not get enough of a say, he does not have the freedom he should be getting,” he said. ASI Ombale did an incredible act of bravery by facing bullets to help capture a terrorist. “But he did not have the equipment to save himself,” Rahul pointed out. “We have to say that we will not tolerate the loss of a single life,” he added.
Rahul said mere defence to the attacks would not be enough and country would have to give up tolerating the killing of Indians. “It is not enough for us to protect the people... we should go one step beyond. People who have done this should understand very clearly... not only do we hold lives of our people highly, but there is also a cost of killing innocent Indians.”
In keeping up his anguish, expressed at CWC meeting where he asked what was to be done about Pakistan and likened the attacks to someone barging into one’s home and slapping the householder, Rahul dubbed it an act of “war on India”. It is a description which, with the terrorism’s clear links to Pakistan, could raise the party rhetoric to a new level.
The young MP was speaking on a debate on terrorism in which senior government ministers and party leaders tried to defend the government as well as put across the steps taken to contain export of terror from across the border.
But as international diplomacy and intelligence dominated the arguments, Rahul pointed fingers inwards to urge MPs-MLAs to stop “politicization of police”. He said the attitude among public representatives that they can interfere with the police be it transfer or promotions would have to go for the cops to do a professional job. “In the interest of the nation, we should desist from it,” he said.
Rahul appealed that challenges like terror were an opportunity for the society to give up its differences and political partisanship, saying that terrorists did not discriminate between religion and caste of Indians while killing them. “If our enemies view us as one, we have to act as one,” he said. He said a “national priority and a national response” was needed to effectively deal with the war being waged on India.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/VIPs_should_leave_cops_alone_Rahul_Gandhi/articleshow/3824960.cms
Kurla court remands Purohit in three-day police custody
MUMBAI: Kurla magistrate's court on Saturday remanded Lt Col Prasad Purohit, prime accused in Malegaon blast case, to three-day custody of Matunga
police.
Purohit was wanted by Suburban Matunga police in a forgery case.
Purohit allegedly provided Sudhakar Chaturvedi, an accused in Malegaon blast case arrested by Matunga police last month, with a revolver and forged license papers.
'Time to bid goodbye to jihad diplomacy'
13 Dec 2008, 0939 hrs IST, TNN
NEW DELHI: A well-known Pakistan commentator feels it's about time the diplomacy of jihad was discontinued. The right lessons drawn from 26/11 could
turn out to be a blessing in disguise for the Islamic republic, he says.
"It may be time to bid a final farewell to the diplomacy of 'jihad'. There was a time when Pakistan could get away with the sponsoring of crossborder 'jihad'. Profiting by the Afghan experience, and indeed spurred by it, we did it again in Kashmir. The concept of 'jihad' may be alive and well in Afghanistan but it has become passe, a dangerous fad to nurture, in Pakistan," writes noted political commentator Ayaz Amir in Friday's The News International newspaper.
Amir adds that Pakistan must not be provoked into any panic reaction by the US and India.
"We must deal with the problem in our own way and on our own terms. Pakistan thus faces a double task: exorcising the ghosts of 'jihad' and at the same time, while seeking American friendship, saying goodbye to the military alliance with the United States which sits like a yoke round our necks. In a way, therefore, if the proper lessons are drawn, Mumbai, a terrible event for India, may turn out to be a blessing for Pakistan, helping to concentrate Pakistani minds and enabling Pakistan to take the turning that otherwise it might not have taken so soon," he says.
Writing in the Frontier Post, Muhammad Asif too calls for self-introspection. "Instead of looking at our problems, we as a nation have chosen to bury our heads in the sand and blame India, the US, Israel and almost everyone but do not realise how and why we have landed in such problems," he says in the Peshawar-Quetta-based daily.
He further prods: "We must begin by questioning ourselves whether the war on terror is our war. Who is occupying our territory, and who is killing us in our cities? Can we negotiate with someone who is bent upon destroying us and forces his warped ideology upon us? The issue is that Zia created this menace. Instead of accepting responsibility for making this nation hostage to all sorts of extremists' criminal groups who abuse the name of Islam and jihad, these post-Zia era rulers want us to believe through media that this is all because of the policies of the USA. India and US have played a big part in this but they only exploited our weaknesses. Only when we nib the root cause of the sickness will we be able to mend the situation."
The Karachi headquartered Dawn newspaper provides some inside information on what US Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte told Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari and PM Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani on his visit to Pakistan. Quoting unnamed sources, it says, "Negroponte delivered Indian assurances that military options would not be considered as long as Pakistan maintained a verifiable commitment against proscribed groups."
The report published on Friday further said "the Deputy Secretary of State also emphasized the need to maintain troop presence in the troubled north of the country, urging Pakistan not to redeploy troops to the Indian border. Sources said that the US was troubled by Taliban attacks on its supply lines in Pakistan, and called for the government to improve security."
Sources also informed Dawn that "Negroponte shared a list of militant groups which needed to be cracked down on, which included well known groups such as Lashkar-i-Taiba, Jamaat-ud-Dawa, Jaish-e-Muhammad, and the Al-Rashid Trust as well as revealing several new groups, such as Pasban-e-Ahle-Hadith."
The Dawn's editorial said that half-hearted measures against militants wouldn't serve the purpose. "If Hafiz Saeed and his men are involved in the Mumbai attacks, they must be prosecuted. The Lashkar and its offshoots must be shut down —- as must other groups that preach mayhem," the editorial noted.
Meanwhile, according to a December 12 report published in The Nation newspaper, Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan's General Secretary Munawar Hassan has strongly criticised the United Nations for what he termed as its 'double standards' for banning Pakistani religious organizations including Jamaat-ud-Daawa and 'branding' its citizens terror suspects.
Hassan observed on Thursday, "Mumbai attacks exposed the performance of Indian intelligence agencies and added that to cover their own weaknesses India took to old tactics of blaming Pakistan."
He also recalled "that US had itself praised the JuD over the voluntarily work for humanity in the past. He said President Zardari himself had said that RAW could be behind Balochistan insurgency but he did not dare protest against the same with the Indian government."
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/Time_to_bid_goodbye_to_jihad_diplomacy/articleshow/3831524.cms
VIPs should leave cops alone: Rahul Gandhi
12 Dec 2008, 0202 hrs IST, TNN
India: house arrest, sealing won’t do
Sandeep Dikshit
Dismantle terror infrastructure, Pakistan told
NEW DELHI: India has told United States interlocuters that it remains unimpressed with the house arrest of the chief of the Jamat-ud-Dawah and the reported sealing of some of the offices of this front organisation of the Laskhar-e-Taiba. The steps initiated by Pakistan should be taken to their logical conclusion, including dismantling of the terror infrastructure. This was conveyed during a telephonic conversation with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice on Wednesday and during meetings with U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte on Friday.
Pointing out that its penal code was the same as Pakistan’s, India said it did not think the restraint orders on the men identified as terrorists by the United Nations Security Council were sufficient steps. For, this was done briefly earlier also by Islamabad after the Parliament House attack in 2001.
The Indian position was also endorsed by Germany, which said the arrest of the LeT chief was not sufficient and Pakistan must do more to ensure that its territory was not used for committing violence in third countries. German Home Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble told journalists that, “forbidding an organisation is one thing and to avoid crimes is another.” While advising Pakistan to “ensure that nobody commits terrorist attacks or other crimes,” he admitted that it was a “difficult situation” for Islamabad and wondered if there was any alternative.
Mr. Schaeuble who, among others, met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and National Security Advisor M.K. Narayanan, said he was told that the intention behind the several acts of terror that rocked India was to provoke Hindus and Muslims and cause tension. He appreciated India’s response that did not include the option of military strikes and saw dialogue and cooperation with Pakistan as the only solution.
Meanwhile, Mr. Negroponte, in his meetings with External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon and Mr. Narayanan, agreed that the attacks should be thoroughly investigated and those responsible for perpetrating these incidents brought to account.
“A positive step”
PTI reports from Washington/Islamabad:
Ms. Rice, Mr. Negroponte and State Department spokesman Sean McCormack spoke in tandem, sending a strong signal to Pakistan that more needed to be done to prevent future terror attacks. Mr. McCormack, however, termed the crackdown in Pakistan on radical elements a “positive step.”
Diplomatic sources told PTI in Islamabad that Mr. Negroponte assured the Pakistani leadership that the U.S. would prevent any military action as long as Pakistan continued taking action against banned terror groups.
http://www.hindu.com/2008/12/13/stories/2008121357520100.htm
No fear of peace process being derailed: Gilani
Reuters
Published on Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 18:39, Updated on Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 18:57 in World section
Islamabad: International diplomacy was defusing tension with India after the militant attack on Mumbai, and action against militant groups should reassure New Delhi, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said on Saturday.
Whereas prospects of a military confrontation between the nuclear-armed neighbours has receded in the two weeks since the slaughter of over 200 people in Mumbai, India has said a four-year-old peace process is in jeopardy.
"Normalisation takes time," Gilani told Reuters in an interview.
The United States has been at the forefront of intense diplomatic efforts to stop tension erupting into a full-blown crisis between two countries that have already fought three wars.
"All our common friends and responsible statesmen are playing their important role in defusing the situation and I'm pretty sure that will work," Gilani stated.
Declare Pak a terrorist state: Indian Americans
Kasab is my son, says Mumbai attacker's father
He said Pakistan was taking its own action against groups and people put on a UN terrorist list, and the chances of India resorting to air strikes against militant targets were remote.
"I think India is equally responsible and they won't. There is no fear of anything like that," Gilani said.
Indian and US officials have levelled accusations at Lashkar-e-Toiba, a jihadi organisation that fought Indian rule in Kashmir and, according to analysts, has had close ties to the Pakistani military's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency.
Pakistan began raiding and shutting offices and schools of Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) charity, linked to Lashkar, late on Thursday. Scores of activists have been detained.
The US Security Council had put the charity and its head, Hafiz Saeed, on a list of individuals and organisations linked to al-Qaeda and the Taliban late on Wednesday.
Saeed, who has been put under house arrest, founded Lashkar, but quit it days before Pakistan banned it in 2002, but he stayed as head of the charity, raising funds and drawing recruits.
Saeed and the JuD have said they would go to the courts to remove the restrictions on their activities, the freeze of their bank accounts, and block on their travel.
Having seen the ineffectiveness of Pakistan's past measures, and harbouring suspicion that security agencies have retained links with Lashkar and other groups, Indian officials privately doubt whether any decisive action will be taken this time.
UN BACKING
Gilani said the latest crackdown on anti-Indian jihadi organisations would go beyond previous ineffective bans because UN resolutions gave the government a stronger legal position.
"Now we have to act according to the United Nations resolutions," Gilani said.
The government of General Pervez Musharraf banned Lashkar and Jaish-e-Mohammad shortly after the two groups were blamed for a raid on the Indian Parliament in 2001.
But analysts say those bans were a sham and Pakistan's ISI allowed the militants to thrive in order to unleash them whenever they wanted to unsettle New Delhi.
Gilani said the insurgency in Indian Kashmir was indigenous, "not state-sponsored" and "nothing to do with Pakistan".
Pressed on whether his government would act against armed groups based in Pakistan and fighting in Kashmir, Gilani replied: "Certainly, if Pakistan soil is being used for any such activity, the law will take its own course."
He said India has yet to supply hard evidence of Pakistani links to Mumbai attack, but hoped this would be forthcoming when foreign ministers from both countries meet on Sunday in Paris on the sidelines of a conference on Afghanistan.
Gilani reiterated Pakistan's position that anyone caught in Pakistan would be tried there also, and suspects wouldn't be handed over to India.
"We will go according to our own law," he said. "There is no such thing of handing over to India."
He also set out plans to snap links between Islamic charities and militant groups. He said charitable trusts and schools would be overhauled by the government, new boards of directors formed, and their work would be regularly monitored.
Gilani said the greatest threat to Pakistan was terrorism, and one of the root causes was economic. Faced with an economic crisis, that the International Monetary Fund has papered over last month with a $7.6 billion loan, Gilani said he was looking for multilateral lenders and friendly governments to help Pakistan meet the challenges.
Potential donors are expected to meet next month in a "Friends of Pakistan" conference.
Pak. will not hand over suspects to India: Gilani
Islamabad (IANS): Reiterating that his government will not hand over any terror suspect to India, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on Saturday said he had not received any evidence of any Pakistani's involvement in the Mumbai carnage.
In an interview with a Gulf television channel, he said if anyone was found involved in any terrorist activity, he will be dealt with according to the law but will "not be handed over to India".
Indian authorities have maintained that the 10 terrorists who struck Mumbai on the night of November 26 has come from Pakistan. In a demarche served to the Pakistani High Commissioner in New Delhi, India has asked Pakistan to hand over 40 people it says are fugitives and responsible for various acts of terror in the country.
Gilani, however, said Pakistani authorities had so far not received any evidence of the use of Pakistan's soil in the attacks that killed at least 170 people, including 22 foreigners.
"If India has any solid evidence it should share it with Pakistan," he said adding Pakistan is ready to help India in investigations.
The Prime Minister said his government had taken action against the Jamat-ud-Dawah (JuD), considered a front of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), as a responsible state and abiding by the international laws and not any pressure from India.
Following India's representation on Tuesday, the U.N. Security Council proscribed the JuD.
Amid rising tensions between the two South Asian neighbours, Gilani said India was a responsible state and will not launch any strike against Pakistan.
He added some international "common friends" were trying to restore normalcy between India and Pakistan.
'I am going away for jehad': Ajmal told people of his village
Islamabad (PTI): Ajmal Amir Iman, the lone gunman captured for the Mumbai terror attacks, told residents of his village in Pakistan's Punjab province during his last visit there that he was going away for jehad.
Iman, also known as Ajmal Kasab, visited Faridkot village in Okara district of Punjab about five months ago and asked his mother to bless him before he embarked on jehad, local residents were quoted as saying in a report aired by Geo News channel on Saturday.
"He came to the village about five or six months ago. He told his mother he was going away for jehad. He asked her to bless him and to leave his fate in the hands of Allah," said an unnamed resident of Faridkot in what the channel described as secretly filmed footage.
The channel said most people of Faridkot and nearby Depalpur sub-district were reluctant to talk about Iman on the record. However, in the secretly filmed footage, some residents were shown discussing his last visit to the village.
"A man from Faridkot said that on his last visit to the village, Ajmal gathered a group of boys near a school and asked them to catch him. He demonstrated feats of wrestling to them. Then we heard he had left home and joined a jehadi group," a man said.
A village elder shown in the footage said Iman's father Amir Kasab had moved to Faridkot from the nearby Haveli Lakha. Amir Kasab used to sell 'pakoras' from a hand cart that he pushed around the village, the elder said.
The president of the press club in Depalpur too confirmed in secretly filmed footage that Iman was from Faridkot. The channel also quoted residents of Faridkot as saying that Iman's father had confirmed to several people that the gunman whose pictures were shown in the media was his son.
NSG, not god, saved us at Taj: CPM MP
New Delhi Recalling his ordeal inside the Taj during the November 26 Mumbai carnage, CPM MP N N Krishnadas on Friday said had it not been for the presence of NSG commandos, he would not have survived on that fateful day.
"It is NSG and not god that saved us," Krishnadas, who was stuck inside the Taj along with four other MPs, said when asked whether he would be thankful to god for his survival.
The veteran Communist leader was inside the hotel on November 26 night for a meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on Subordinate Legislation, of which he is the chairman.
"We were having dinner at the 'Shamiana' when the attack took place. The hotel staff took us through a narrow staircase to the first floor lobby. We remained there for the whole night and the next morning the NSG arrived," Krishnadas said.
There were about 200 people in the lobby when security forces launched the rescue mission.
"We were all witness to the gun fights, blasts and the fire that took place the whole night inside the hotel. It was only when the commandos arrived, we felt secure," he said.
On the question of delay in the rescue operation, he said, "NSG has to come from Delhi. And then, our security forces were not familiar with the hotel's layout plan while terrorists seem to be well acquainted with the place. That could be the obstacle in its security operation," the MP said.
He demanded that there should be NSG hubs in every major cities and state police should also be trained in commando operation.
Kasab writes to Pak High Commission, seeks legal aid
Mumbai: Mohammad Ajmal Amir Iman, who was arrested on November 26 during the Mumbai terror attack, has written a letter to the Pakistan High Commission seeking legal help.
The letter has been forwarded by the Mumbai police to the External Affairs and the Union Home Ministries for necessary action, Joint Commissioner of Police Rakesh Maria said on Saturday.
Maria said Ajmal has also asked the Pakistan High Commission to take custody of the body of fellow terrorist Ismail Khan who was killed in an encounter in South Mumbai the same night.
Iman, also known as Ajmal Kasab, is the only terrorist captured alive by police during the operation while nine other terrorists involved in the terror attack at Taj, Oberoi-Trident Hotels and Nariman House besides Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus and Cama Hospital were killed.
Ajmal has been remanded to police custody till December 24.
However, the Pakistan High Commission in Delhi denied having received any letter from Iman.
"We have not received any letter," a Pakistan High Commission spokesman said.
Pakistan's denial comes against mounting evidence that Iman, who hails from Faridkot vilage in Punjab province of Pakistan.
Meanwhile, advocate Ashok Sarogi said a social organisation has approached him to represent Ajmal and his view was that ‘nobody should go undefended.’
Asked whether he would be representing Ajmal, Sarogi said, "nothing is final but discussion is on. Let's see."
Sarogi had in the past represented gangster Abu Salem who is facing trial in 1993 Mumbai serial blasts case.
Several lawyers of Mumbai have refused to defend Ajmal and Bombay Metropolitan Magistrate Courts' Bar Association adopted a resolution deciding not to take up the terrorist's case.
Earlier, Advocate Dinesh Mota, the senior most member of the Legal Aid Panel, refused to represent Ajmal saying ‘I am a Mumbaikar and all the victims (of terror attack) are like my family. Why would I ever represent him?’
Ajmal, the Pakistani national is facing a dozen charges including waging war against the country and murder.
He was also involved in the killing of three senior police officials, including ATS chief Hemant Karkare in November 26 night near Cama hospital in South Mumbai.
Economic crisis forcing NYT to cut costs
New York Massive revenue decline as a result of global economic downturn is fast eroding media's advertising base, forcing major newspapers in the US to look for cost cutting measures.
The latest victim is the New York Times which told its print and web employees that non union staff would receive no pay raises next year, Forbes.com reported.
The announcement comes a day after Newsweek was reported to have been considering reducing staff and cutting print order for the magazine.
"Advertising revenues at both the paper and the website remain weak and the financial outlook for 2009 is daunting," the staff was told in an internal e-mail from Times' publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr, which Forbes.com claimed to have obtained.
In October, advertising revenues from its New York Times Media Group, which includes properties such as the 'Times' and the 'International Herald Tribune', dropped 15.3 per cent as compare to the same period last year, Forbes said.
At the time, its advertising revenue for the group was down 10.6 per cent over last year for a total of some USD 900 million, Forbes quoted the company as saying, as a result, the organisation has been aggressively trying to cut costs.
Earlier this month, the Times had announced that it was planning to borrow USD 225 million against its New Manhattan headquarters because of a cash flow squeeze.
In September, the Times had announced to close its wholesale newspaper distributor, City & Suburban, which delivered the Times and more than 200 other publications to newsstands and other locations in New York.
The newspaper has also consolidated some print sections such as mashing its sports section into its business section, Forbes said.
Nevertheless, Sulzberger told employees that efforts were falling short. "We felt it was essential to take this step to further control our costs during these hard times."
Meanwhile, Detroit Media Partnership L P, which operates the Detroit Free Press and the Detroit News, is expected to announce next week that it will cease home delivery of the papers' print editions on most days of the week, the Wall Street Journal reported citing people familiar with the company's policy.
But actual scenario set to be unveiled Tuesday when the Free Press, the 20th largest US newspaper in terms of weekday circulation, and the News, are to end home delivery on all but the most lucrative days -- Thursday, Friday and Sunday.
On other days, the company would sell abbreviated print editions at newsstands and direct readers to the papers' expanded digital editions.
Both The Free Press, owned by Gannett Co and the News, owned by MediaNews Group, are operated by Detroit Media. The Free Press and the News would be the first dailies in a metropolitan market to curtail home delivery and scale down their print editions. But the Journal said other newspapers are contemplating similar moves.
In October, the Christian Science Monitor said it will stop printing a daily newspaper in April and move instead to an online version with a weekly print product.
The changes are likely to result in significant job cuts, the Journal said, adding that Gannett, which owns 85 daily newspapers, recently said it was eliminating 2,000 positions as part of a 10 per cent staff reduction. Two of its papers, USA Today and the Free Press, were not part of the layoff. "The Detroit Media Partnership is looking at everything right now just like everyone else in the country," its spokesman Leland K Bassett was quoted as saying. The cuts are expected to come mostly, if not entirely, from outside the newsroom, the report added.
Harappan Civilization: An Analysis in Modern Context
The Harappan Civilization has significance for not only historians and archaeologists but also the common man. Though the first Harappan sites were discovered way backing 1920-21, by archaeologists Dr. D.R. Sahni and Dr. R.D. Banerjee (Harappa in Punjab and Mohenjo-Daro in Sind - both in Pakistan now) fresh sites are still being unearthed, ading insight into the rich culture of the Harappan civilization.
Some of the most striking aspects of the discoveries are the town planning and architecture, art and crafts and the social, religious and economic condition of that era. Much has been known about the town planning and architecture of the Harappan civilization. The cities boasted of well-planned roads wide and straight, houses provided with an efficient drainage system and ventilation.
The excavations have yielded a rich collection of objects in stone, bronze and terracotta. One of the most known figurines is perhaps the `dancing girl' (in bronze) naked but for a necklace and a series of bangles almost covering one arm, her hair dressed in a complicated coiffure, standing in a provocative posture, with one arm on her hip and one lanky leg half bent. This face has an air of lively pertness quite unlike anything in the work of other ancient civilizations. Her thin boyish figure and those of the mother goddesses found here, indicate incidentally, that the ideas of gfemale beauty among the Harappan people were very different from those of later India. It has been suggested that this `dancing girl' is representative of a class of temple dancers and prostitutes, such as existed in contemporary Middle Eastern civilizations and were an important feature of later Hindu culture, but this cannot be proved. It is not certain that the girl is a dancer much less a temple dancer.
In stone much discussed are two male figures - one is a the torso in red sandstone and the other is the bust of a bearded man. In the former, the limbs have been made separately and fitted into sockets.
The Harappan people also made rough terracotta statuettes of women, usually naked, but with elaborate head dresses, These are certainly icons of the mother goddess and are so numerous that they seem to have been kept in nearly every home. They are crudely fashioned so historians assume that the Goddess was not favoured by the upper classes who commanded the services of the best craftsmen, but that her effigies were mass produced by humble potters to meet popular demand. In terracotta we also find a few figurines of bearded male with coiled hair, their posture rigidly upright, legs slightly apart, and the arms parallel, to the sides of the body. The repetition of this figure in exactly the same position would suggest that he was a deity. A terracotta mask of a horned deity has also been found.
Archaeologists have discovered thousands of seals with beautiful figures of animals, such as unicorn bull, rhinoceros, tiger, elephant, bison, goat, buffalo etc. The most remarkable seal is Pashupati Seal (size: 1/2" to 2" with square and rectangular shape). From the seals it appears certain that the Indus valley civilization had trade links with Mesapatomia and perhaps merchants from India even visited and stayed there. The stanhdard Harappan seal was a square plaque 2 x 2 sq. inches usually made from the soft river stone steatite. Every seal is engraved in a pictographic script (yet to be deciphered). It appears that the seals were also used as amulets, carried on the persons of their owners, perhaps as modern day identity cards. Some seals have also been found in gold, ivory or blue or white. They all bear a great variety of designs, most often of animals including bull, with or without hump, elephant, tiger, goat and also monsters. Sometimes trees or human figures were also depicted.
The jewelry in gold and silver-bangles, necklaces and other ornaments are well crafted. They are "so well finished and so highly polished that they might have come out of a Bond Street Jeweller's of today rather than from a pre-historic house of thousands years ago" says Marshall. The Harappan people also made brilliantly naturalistic models of animals, specially monkeys and squirrels, used as pin-heads and beads. They also made toys in terracotta with movable heads, monkeys which would slide down a string, little toy carts (one of the oldest example of a wheeled vehicle) and whistles shaped like birds.
Tools of stone, copper and bronze have been found, which in many respects were technologically sound. The blades were flat and easily bent while the axe heads had to be lashed to their shafts. In the design of one tool, however, the Harappans had been superior; they had devised a saw with undulating teeth, which allowed the dust to escape freely from the cut and much simplified the carpenter's craft.
The origin and the race of the Harappan are still a matter of dispute. While one section of scholars believes that they were Dravidian, definitely Indo-Aryan, another section believes that they were the same as Sumerians or the Cretans. The Harappan script has not been deciphered but the discovery of writing material clearly indicates that the Harappans were educated.
The discovery of a large number of spindles of various sizes indicate that threads both of cotton and woolen must have been spun in those days. Spindle whorls made of pottery, shell and faience have been found. From the statues it appears both men and women wore two separate pieces of clothes similar to dhoti and shawl (covering lower and upper parts of the body respectively). The `shawl' covered the left shoulder, passing below the right shoulder. No footwear has survived nor is it shown in any of the figures. Both men and women wore ornaments. While necklaces, fillets, armlets and finger-rings were common to both sexes, women wore girdles, earrings and anklets. Ornaments were made of gold, silver, copper, ivory, precious and semi-precious stones, bones and shells etc. From archaeological findings it appears that the Harappans were conscious of fashion. Different hairstyles and beards were in vogue. Cinnabar was used as a cosmetic and face-paints, lipsticks and collyrium (eye liners) were also known to them.
http://ignca.nic.in/nl002308.htm
Kalighat Kalika
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A famous temple dedicated to the goddess Kali is situated in Kalighat. This is one of the 51 Shakti Peethas. The right toe of Dakshayani is said to have fallen here. The Shakti here is known as Kalika, while the Bhairava is Nakulesh. It is a very famous place and a pilgrimage for Shakta (Shiva and Durga/Kali/Shakti worshippers) followers within the Hindu religion.
One Raja Basanta Roy, uncle of Pratapaditya and the King of Jessore, Bangladesh perhaps built what is now known as Old Temple. This temple was situated on the banks of river Adi Ganga. The natmandir, a hall attached to the sanctum sanctorum is in the southern side while Shiva's temple is situated in the north-east. There is also a temple dedicated to Radha Krishna built in 1843 by a zamindar of Baowali. The speciality of Kali of this temple is the long protruded tongue made of gold. This is a different appearance from the other visualisations of Kali.
Kalighat temple has references in 15th century texts. The original temple was a small hut. The present temple was built by the Sabarna Roy Choudhuryfamily of Barisha in 1809. They offered 595 bighas of land to the Temple deity so that worship and service could be continued smoothly. It is believed by some scholars that the name Calcutta was derived from Kalighata. In the early days traders halted at Kalighat to pay patronage to the goddess. The temple was initially on the banks of Hooghly. The river over a period of time has moved away from the temple. The temple is now on the banks of a small canal called Adi Ganga, connecting to Hooghly. The present dakshina Kali idol of touchstone was created by two saints - Brahmananda Giri and Atmaram Giri. It was Padmabati Devi, the mother of Laksmikanta Roy Choudhury who discovered the fossils of Sati's finger in a lake called Kalikunda. This made Kalighat as one of the 51 Shakti Pithas.[1]
Kalika's Image
The image of the deity is incomplete. Only the face of the deity was made first. The hands, made of gold and silver, the tongue, the Shiva statue and all the jewellery were added over the years. On snanyatra day, while giving Mother the ceremonial bath, the priests tie their eyes with cloth coverings. On auspicious occasions like Kali Puja, Durga Puja, Poila Boishakh, the Bengali New Year day and sankranti large number of devotees throng the place with offerings.
[edit] Kalighat painting
Kalighat painting, or pata (pronounced 'pot') is a style of Indian painting derives its name from the place. It is characterised by generously curving figures of both men and women and an earthy satirical style. It developed during the nineteenth century in response to the sudden prosperity brought to Calcutta by the East India Company trade, whereby many houses including that of 'Prince' Dwarkanath Tagore, grandfather of Rabindranath Tagore became incredibly wealthy. Many of these nouveau riche families came from not particular exalted caste backgrounds, so the orthodox tended to frown on them and their often very tasteless conspicuous consumption. To the common people the 'babu's, as they were called, were equally objects of fun and sources of income. Thus the 'babu culture' portrayed in the Kalighat patas often shows inversions of the social order (wives beating husbands or leading them about in the guise of pet goats or dogs, maidservants wearing shoes, sahibs in undignified postures, domestic contretemps, and the like.) They also showed European innovations (babus wearing European clothes, smoking pipes, reading at desks, etc). The object of this is only partly satirical; it also expresses the wonder that ordinary Bengalis felt on exposure to these new and curious ways and objects.
Kalighat pata pictures are highly stylised, do not use perspective, are usually pen and ink line drawings filled in with flat bright colours and normally use paper as a substrate, though some may be found with cloth backing or on cloth. The artists were rarely educated, and usually came from a lineage of artisans. Kalighat patas are still made today although genuine work is hard to come by. The art form is urban and largely secular: although gods and goddesses are often depicted, they appear in much the same de-romanticised way as the humans do. By contrast, the Orissa tradition of pata-painting, centering around Puri, is consciously devotional. Kalighat pata has been credited with influencing the Bengal School of art associated with Jamini Roy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalighat
Günter Grass's 1988 Zunge zeigen has been criticised as an example of Eurocentricism, an especially harsh charge against this author known for his critique of globalisation. The claim that Grass writes about India as a colonising Westerner overlooks the ways in which he undermines the sovereignty of the Western subject through his polyphonic, self-reflexive account. The result is a sincere attempt to destabilise the oppressive subject he has been accused of promoting. This attempt notwithstanding, Grass's critique does falter for two reasons that critics of Zunge zeigen have not addressed. The first concerns his use of Theodor Fontane both as a bridge to the history of colonialism and as a model for engaged literature. Fontane proves tenuous on both counts, and diverts Grass's attention both from India's colonial history and literary present. Second, Grass's prescription for overcoming the misery he documents in India and Bangladesh – the Enlightenment – ultimately reinscribes a discourse of domination that favours Europe. By choosing Kali, the Hindu goddess of destruction, to represent India, Grass reinforces the notion that rationality is a European invention that is alien to the mystical, chaotic East. Ultimately, Grass fails to account for the Enlightenment's own historical complicity in colonialism.
In the fall and winter of 1987-88, Günter Grass and his wife, Ute, settled in Calcutta for the Bengali-language staging of his 1966 play, ''The Plebeians Rehearse the Uprising.'' ''Show Your Tongue'' is his honest, even passionate response to the fabled and maligned city: 97 pages of journals, a 12-stanza poem and 112 pages of Expressionist drawings. John E. Woods's translation does not betray the urgency and the intimacy of the material.
This one-man show of a book is Mr. Grass's tribute to Calcutta's unparalleled ability to move and engage. It may be Kipling's city of dreadful night, and of the infamous Black Hole, but it's also Dominique Lapierre's city of joy, the home of numerous modern saints (not just Mother Teresa) and master creators. Calcutta was also the home of Subhas Chandra Bose, Bengal's all-time favorite son, impatient freedom fighter, enemy of Gandhi, would-be saboteur of the British war effort, opportunistic ally of the Fascists in World War II and a figure of enormous difficulty for the author of ''The Tin Drum.''
''Show Your Tongue'' (the title is an allusion to the bloody-mouthed, patiently waiting goddess of destruction, Kali, who is usually represented with her tongue hanging out) is in many ways, despite its virtuosity, a modest, very personal book. It charts Mr. Grass's inner journey to a kind of fundamental, uncomplicated political esthetic. Highfalutin phrase - let me illustrate with two examples.
There's no commoner sight in Calcutta than cow dung patties - the cheapest cooking fuel - drying on every graffiti-filled wall, lamppost and sidewalk of the city. Young girls, 6 years old and younger, scoop up the raw dung, fresh from the diseased cows, carry it in baskets on their heads, mix it with straw and coal dust, then squeeze it into patties and set them out in the sun for drying. Many properly outraged and predictable responses are possible; Mr. Grass, provocatively, concentrates on the esthetic: ''All framed and pedestaled works of art should be forced to compete with such scenes from reality.'' This is the working hypothesis of a critic who has experienced the shock of Calcutta. After that city, one grows impatient with SoHo.
He goes further, in a rage that seems (in our English tradition) more in the mode of his spiritual kinsman William Blake - another furious etcher-poet - than of anything contemporary: ''If . . . [ you ] set down instead one single slum hovel, as authentic as want has made it, right next to the glassy arrogance of the Deutsche Bank, beauty would at once be on the side of the hovel, and truth too, even the future. The mirrored art of all those palaces consecrated to money would fall to its knees, because the slum hovel . . . belongs to tomorrow.''
In Calcutta, Mr. Grass touches again on the sources of his pure political passion. The book is dedicated to the Calcutta Social Project, an educational undertaking for the children of the most abject of Calcutta's garbage handlers and garbage dwellers. He spends days helping to get a West German visa for a stateless, exiled Bangladeshi poet. He lectures women cigar-factory workers on the efficacy of strikes in 19th-century German labor history, and of course he's working furiously on his play, his drawings and his journal.
n the fall and winter of 1987-88, Günter Grass and his wife, Ute, settled in Calcutta for the Bengali-language staging of his 1966 play, ''The Plebeians Rehearse the Uprising.'' ''Show Your Tongue'' is his honest, even passionate response to the fabled and maligned city: 97 pages of journals, a 12-stanza poem and 112 pages of Expressionist drawings. John E. Woods's translation does not betray the urgency and the intimacy of the material.
This one-man show of a book is Mr. Grass's tribute to Calcutta's unparalleled ability to move and engage. It may be Kipling's city of dreadful night, and of the infamous Black Hole, but it's also Dominique Lapierre's city of joy, the home of numerous modern saints (not just Mother Teresa) and master creators. Calcutta was also the home of Subhas Chandra Bose, Bengal's all-time favorite son, impatient freedom fighter, enemy of Gandhi, would-be saboteur of the British war effort, opportunistic ally of the Fascists in World War II and a figure of enormous difficulty for the author of ''The Tin Drum.''
''Show Your Tongue'' (the title is an allusion to the bloody-mouthed, patiently waiting goddess of destruction, Kali, who is usually represented with her tongue hanging out) is in many ways, despite its virtuosity, a modest, very personal book. It charts Mr. Grass's inner journey to a kind of fundamental, uncomplicated political esthetic. Highfalutin phrase - let me illustrate with two examples.
There's no commoner sight in Calcutta than cow dung patties - the cheapest cooking fuel - drying on every graffiti-filled wall, lamppost and sidewalk of the city. Young girls, 6 years old and younger, scoop up the raw dung, fresh from the diseased cows, carry it in baskets on their heads, mix it with straw and coal dust, then squeeze it into patties and set them out in the sun for drying. Many properly outraged and predictable responses are possible; Mr. Grass, provocatively, concentrates on the esthetic: ''All framed and pedestaled works of art should be forced to compete with such scenes from reality.'' This is the working hypothesis of a critic who has experienced the shock of Calcutta. After that city, one grows impatient with SoHo.
He goes further, in a rage that seems (in our English tradition) more in the mode of his spiritual kinsman William Blake - another furious etcher-poet - than of anything contemporary: ''If . . . [ you ] set down instead one single slum hovel, as authentic as want has made it, right next to the glassy arrogance of the Deutsche Bank, beauty would at once be on the side of the hovel, and truth too, even the future. The mirrored art of all those palaces consecrated to money would fall to its knees, because the slum hovel . . . belongs to tomorrow.''
In Calcutta, Mr. Grass touches again on the sources of his pure political passion. The book is dedicated to the Calcutta Social Project, an educational undertaking for the children of the most abject of Calcutta's garbage handlers and garbage dwellers. He spends days helping to get a West German visa for a stateless, exiled Bangladeshi poet. He lectures women cigar-factory workers on the efficacy of strikes in 19th-century German labor history, and of course he's working furiously on his play, his drawings and his journal.
ATHENE (or Athena) was the great Olympian goddess of wise counsel, war, the defence of towns, heroic endeavour, weaving, pottery and other crafts. She was depicted crowned with a crested helm, armed with shield and spear, and wearing the snake-trimmed aigis cloak wrapped around her breast and arm, adorned with the monstrous head of the Gorgon.
The more famous myths featuring the goddess Athene include:--
Her birth from the head of Zeus, fully-grown and arrayed in arms;
Her contest with Poseidon for dominion of Athens in which she produced the first olive tree and he the first horse;
The War of the Giants in which she buried Enkelados beneath Mount Etna and made her aigis from the skin of Pallas;
The attempted rape of the goddess by Hephaistos, who spilled his seed upon the earth and produced Erikhthonios, who she then adopted as her own;
The assisting of Perseus in his quest to slay the Gorgon and the Argonauts in their quest for the Golden Fleece;
The assisting of Herakles with his twelve labours;
The weaving contest with Arakhne who was transformed by the goddess into a spider;
The blinding of Teiresias for viewing her naked in the bath;
The Judgement of Paris in which she competed with Hera and Aphrodite for the prize of the golden apple;
The Trojan War where she sided with the Greeks in battle, but attacked their ships with a storm when they failed to punish Oilean Ajax for violating her Trojan shrine.
This site contains a total of 9 pages describing the goddess, the content of which is outlined in the table below. N.B. The Athene pages are still under construction.
NEOLITHIC PERIOD ! ORIGIN OF CULTURE 21
At Langhnaj 5 in Gujarat three zones of microliths are found
without any variation in types. In the first zone the microliths were
associated with, comparatively recent pottery, along with a tanged iron
dagger. In the second zone a different type of pottery, with incised
lattice decoration, was found. The pottery is thin and red slipped over a
pale brown surface. It was associated with microliths, a large quartzite
mace-head, having a central perforation with an hour-glass section, and
pieces of two Neolithic celts of schist and a copper knife. In the third
zone, which is purely Microlithic, sandstone quern fragments, microliths,,
ill-baked pottery have occurred. People were buried in a highly flexed
posture, mostly in east-west direction within the kitchen debris.
Thus, in Gujarat, we have evidence of a Microlithic folk being
introduced into agriculture and pottery, and the original Mesolithic
food-gatherers becoming Neolithic food producers. 6 The evidence
noted at Langhnaj in Gujarat was confirmed at Nagarjunakonda 7 in
the Krishna Valley. The clear stratigraphical evidence obtained here
shows that the pre-pottery Microlithic industry was succeeded by a mixed
lithic industry, containing the true hunting type of microliths, along with
cores, flakes of trap and quartzite, made by a different technique and
wheel-made pottery.
At Sanganakallu, Phase-I was characterised by the presence of a
large number of heavily patinated flakes of trap and sandstone, associated
with a crude Microlithic industry of quartz and chert without any definite
evidence of the association of pottery. Phase-II is divided into two sub-
periods oil the basis of the relative quantitative distribution of two main
fabrics of pottery- the pale grey-ware and the coarse brown and black-
ware-, which dominated the lower and upper levels respectively. The
Sub-pn-icd - It of Phase-II is characterised by the presence of fresh
stone-axes and flakes associated with a fine Microlithic industry of chert
and .jasper with types like parallel-sided blades and lunates, blunted along
the arc. Sub-period-I, as suggested by Subba Rao, corresponds to the
Early Neolithic stone-axe culture. It is characterised by coarse brown
and black hand made wares and a few pieces of pale grey ware in diminish-
ing proportions. In this phase a few sherds, with violet and purple
paintings on a dull back ground and sometimes on a dull red slip, were
found.
Phases-T and II are separated by a thin barren layer on which
Subba Rao has suggested that the gap between Phases-I and II may be
5. Saokalia R.D,, 1905, Excavation at Langhnaj, p.20.
6. Krishnaswamy V.D,, I960, "The Neolithic Pattern of India", AI, Vol. 16, p. 29
7. SouiKiararajan K.V., 1 958, "Studies in the Stone Age of Nagarjunakonda and
Neighbourhood; 1 AI., Vol. 14, pp. 49-1 13.
22 THE PROTO \ND EARLY HISTORICAL CULTURES OF A.P.
filled-up by a large number of lightly patinated chipped and ground-
tools. He characterised this phase as the Early Neolithic.
At Peddabankur in Karimnagar district fluted cores, with pointed
flat or chisel ends, along with crescents or lunates, parallel-sided blades,
leaf points, besides a unique arrow-head of milky quartz, were found
over a thin gravel layer, capping the natural morrum-bed. This imple-
mentiferous layer was sealed by a thick deposit of black cotton soil of
45 cm. thickness. The collection was associated with a highly weathered
and fragile pottery in tiny fragments. The surface of the pottery looks
dull red, possibly due to water logging, as indicated by many shells of
mollusc in the sterile black cotton soil cap. Scores of ground-stone tools
of trap, found in unrelated strata in the course of excavation, may belong
to the above phase, which may be the Early Neolithic as suggested by
Subba Rao. There was no evidence of any pale grey, brown or black
wares typical of the Neolithic.
9
At Polakonda in Warangal district the total Neolithic deposit,
with no visible variation in soil composition, is as thick as 2 m., which
is an indication that the Neolithic habitation continued for a considerably
long time, unruffled by any extraneous influence, The cerami ; assem-
blage consisted of grey, pale-grey, blotchy brown, pale red and small
fragments of black burnished wares. The pottery from the early levels
is more gritty and distinguished by low firing, leaving a thick black core
inside. No painted pottery was recovered in any of the trenches. A few
sherds were decorated with incised oblique slashes, chevrons, cord and
Inger-nail impressions, etc. The Neolithic phases at Polakonda may
correspond to Phase-II,, Sub-period-II of Sanganakallu,
As a result of the above discussion it may now be possible to
reconstruct the sequence of the Neolithic Culture,
Stage-! of the Neolithic is Represented by Phase-II, Sub-period-II
,er SsngAnaksalh and Phases - 1 and U of Polakonda in Warangal
indicating the presence of a thick jungle in the past. The
site at Peddabankur was covered with a thick deposit of
black soil over a bed of granitic morrum. At a few spots the
soil covering was washed away, denuding the natural morrum.
Miorolithic implements were collected over these denuded, spots,
same level, under the thick black soil cover in other excavated
; ? the industry was noticed over the same morrum bed, indicating
daring post-raicrolithic period the black cotton soil must have
deposited daring a wet period.
Arid and dry climatic conditions during the Neolithic period
" by the presence of some plant remains, such as acacia
http://www.archive.org/stream/protoandearlyhis024606mbp/protoandearlyhis024606mbp_djvu.txt
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